Hello,
My name is Anne-Marie, I am a student of SFU in the Masters of Health Education and Active Living (HEAL).
 More importantly, I am a wife, a mother, a teacher and a healthcare practitioner, specifically a Registered Massage Therapist.  This Masters degree is meant as an addition to who I have been for what is coming up to be 44 years now.  The next 2 years are being set aside for growth and reinvention, brain stretching is what I am aiming for.
Already 2 days in and I am learning how to blog, which, for me, is a serious exercise in brain stretching.  I am not computer literate.  My teenage son has been sitting next to me for the past 45 minutes painstakingly trying to teach me how to use and organize this blog, amazingly enough I did not get one eye roll from him, we are having a good day!
A little bit about my background.  After a weak start in Nursing back in Montreal, I moved to Vancouver to study Massage Therapy.  Graduating from West Coast College of Massage Therapy (WCCMT)  in 1997, I first left for what was probably the coolest job in my world at the time, being an RMT for a Helicopter skiing company in the middle of nowhere land British Columbia.  It was brilliant, I got to ski and ski and ski, oh and of course work...
I then came back to the real world and have been working ever since as an RMT in North Vancouver in various clinics.  In 2005, after having my second child, I decided to push my boundaries and stress my comfort zone and started working at WCCMT as a teaching assistant and a clinic supervisor.  I quickly discovered a love for education.  In time I took on a lead instructor position and through some trial and error, I slowly became a teacher.
Now 11 years on, I have learnt an amazing amount from my time in the classroom with my students.  I am ready to push these new boundaries and use these next two years to "explode" right out of my little box.
So, other than blowing up my surroundings with all my new knowledge bombs, what am I planning to do with this Masters degree?  That is a very big question I have yet to fully answer.  Loosely floating in my mind at this present moment is the idea that I would like to help bring Massage Therapy education to a higher level. Presently, RMT programs in Canada are mostly being taught in private for profit schools, only a very few programs are being offered in a public setting.  I am lucky enough to be one of the few teachers working in a public college teaching in an RMT program, Langara College.  That said, we are still offered as a continuing education program, therefore, although in a public college, we are not funded by the government.  Massage Therapy education is very expensive, close to $40 000 for a two year program.  Getting a stronger background in Health Education, I hope to be part of a team that could bring our program fully into the public system, which would increase Massage Therapy education quality overall and making it much more affordable.  On a even greater scheme, maybe even elevate RMT education from a diploma to a full degree.  Big lofty goals, I know!